OSV News
Pope Leo XIV has appointed four U.S.-based scholars and leaders as members of the Dicastery for the Promotion of Integral Human Development.
Named among 11 new dicastery members the Holy See announced March 30 are: Holy Cross Father Daniel Groody, vice president and associate provost for undergraduate education and professor of theology and global affairs at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana; Meghan J. Clark, assistant chair of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies of St. John’s University in New York; Dylan Corbett, executive director of the Hope Border Institute in El Paso, Texas; and Leocadie Lushombo, professor of theological ethics at the Jesuit School of Theology of Santa Clara University in Berkeley, California.
Established by Pope Francis in 2016, the dicastery supports the church’s efforts in the areas of human dignity and human rights, economic justice, care for creation, migration and displacement, as well as peace, conflict and humanitarian crises. It is led by Canadian Cardinal Michael Czerny. Dicastery members contribute to the body’s ongoing discernment process on the church’s humanitarian mission and priorities.
Corbett, whose work with the Hope Border Institute applies the perspective of Catholic social teaching in policy and practice to the U.S.-Mexico border region, said in a statement that he was “humbled by this appointment.”
“The pope is very attentive to God’s work in border communities and with people who are migrating to bring about a more just and compassionate world,” he said.
Lushombo likewise described herself as “delighted, honored, and humbled” by the appointment.
In a statement, she noted her previous collaboration with the dicastery as member of a study group from 2024-2025 analyzing documents from the Synod on Synodality that related to the poor and care for creation.
“The mission of the IHD Dicastery is to promote the human dignity of all individuals, without exception, with particular attention to the weakest, the least, and the excluded,” said Lushombo, a member of the Teresian Association, an international Catholic association of laypeople.